NYC Coronavirus Funerals Have Not Flattened, Officials Say

BROOKLYN, NEW YORK — Dozens of rotting bodies found at an overwhelmed Brooklyn funeral home shed light on morgues' and funeral homes' struggles during the coronavirus pandemic.

Novel coronavirus cases appear to be flattening out, even dropping, in New York City, but the deaths — 18,706 confirmed and probable as of May 3 — are stretching the city's "death care" industry, said Brooklyn Borough President Eric Adams on Monday.

"Their numbers have not flattened," he said.

Adams on Monday convened a virtual meeting of funeral home advocates, religious leaders and the city's medical examiners to address the coronavirus pandemic's impact on funerals, morgues and cemeteries.

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It followed last week's discovery of about 50 bodies found stacked in unrefrigerated trucks parked outside a Flatlands funeral home, where a passerby complained about the smell of decay. The funeral home, Andrew T. Cleckley Funeral Home on Utica Avenue, apparently became overwhelmed by a rush of bodies amid the coronavirus outbreak.

State officials suspended the funeral home's license and elected officials decried the situation.

"Why on earth did they not either alert the state or go to their NYPD precinct and ask for help?" Mayor Bill de Blasio said last week. "It's unconscionable for me."

Funeral directors on the Monday call learned they'll no longer have to pick up bodies from the city's morgue in 15 days, Adams said.

"That was really allowing us to remove the system of having to have a burial in a short period of time," he said. "And I think it led to, in some cases, where you had an over-inventory of body remains at funeral parlors because funeral directors were stuck in the middle."

The city will keep the bodies in long-term storage at the 39th Street pier, said Michael DeLoach, a city environmental protection official on the call.

Adams said the Office of the Chief Medical Examiner's hours will be extended and, importantly, funeral homes and cemeteries will receive much-needed personal protective equipment that previously was in short supply.

He also outlined plans to connect grieving families with clergy leaders soon after a loved one's death.

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